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Microsoft announced the Azure Stack at its Ignite event Last year , for running something like Azure on-premises, but how does it differ from the existing Azure Pack, which kind-of does the same thing?

This answer goes to the heart of how Microsoft is changing to become a cloud-first company, at least within its own special meaning of “cloud”. Ignite attendees heard about new versions of Windows Server, SharePoint, Exchange and SQL Server, and the common thread running through all these announcements is that features first deployed in Office 365 or Azure are now coming to the on-premises editions.

Why azure pack and azure stack?

We all living in cloud computing world now. IT people talk about “Cloud” more often. Microsoft Azure is in the top of the list providing proven stable cloud services. It includes IaaS (infrastructure as a service), PaaS (Platform as a service), SaaS (Software as a services) and lot more cloud related services. As we all know azure been very successful with availability, security, performance etc. But most of enterprises, businesses are already done lot of investment to build their infrastructure. This is much more valid for managed service providers. So instead of moving all the service to cloud, people are started to more interest on hybrid-cloud model. So some services will be using public cloud services and same time some services will be run from the datacenter.

To address hybrid-cloud model Microsoft decided to bring the azure technologies to the public so companies can use same technologies used in azure in their own datacenters. So the result was “Azure Pack”.

According to Microsoft,

Windows Azure Pack provides a multi-tenant, self-service cloud that works on top of your existing software and hardware investments. Building on the familiar foundation of Windows Server and System Center, Windows Azure Pack offers a flexible and familiar solution that your business can take advantage of to deliver self-service provisioning and management of infrastructure — Infrastructure as a service (Iaas), and application services — Platform as a Service (PaaS), such as Web Sites and Virtual Machines.

This was big relief for the MSP as they can offer a portal to their customers to manage their resources efficiently.

Azure pack is mainly depending on the infrastructure which is running based on windows server and system center. It uses system center virtual machine manager to manage virtual machines. It uses system center service provider foundation service to integrate all the related operations between portals and services. Following are some great features of azure pack.

Well azure pack was the first big step toward the path, but the technology keeps changing every day. With new version of windows server software defined storage, software defined networking will do revolution change. To face this new requirement solution is the Azure stack.Microsoft keep sharpening up the azure platform. With azure stack, it will bring same proven cloud capabilities to the hybrid-cloud.

Azure Pack was “an effort to replicate the cloud experience,” Microsoft’s Ryan O’Hara (senior director, product management told the press at Ignite. By contrast, Azure Stack is “a re-implementation of not only the experience but the underlying services, the management model as well as the datacenter infrastructure.”

In other words, there is more Azure and less System Center in Stack versus Pack, and that is a good indication of Microsoft’s direction. That said, Microsoft’s Azure Stack slide says “powered by Windows Server, System Center and Azure technologies,” so we should expect bits of System Center to remain.

According to Mike Neil, General Manager for Windows Server, Microsoft

Microsoft Azure Stack extends the agile Azure model of application development and deployment to your datacenter. Azure Stack delivers IaaS and PaaS services into your datacenter so you can easily blend your enterprise applications such as SQL Server, SharePoint, and Exchange with modern distributed applications and services while maintaining centralized oversight. Using Azure Resource Manager (just released in preview last week), you get consistent application deployments every time, whether provisioned to Azure in the public cloud or Azure Stack in a datacenter environment. This approach is unique in the industry and gives your developers the flexibility to create applications once and then decide where to deploy them later – all with role-based access control to meet your compliance needs.

Built on the same core technology as Azure, Azure Stack packages Microsoft’s investments in automated and software-defined infrastructure from our public cloud datacenters and delivers them to you for a more flexible and secure datacenter environment. For example, Azure Stack includes a scalable and flexible software-defined Network Controller and Storage Spaces Direct with automated sync and failover. Shielded VMs and Guarded Hosts bring “zero-trust” software-defined security to your private cloud so you can securely segment organizations and workloads and centrally control and monitor access and administration rights. Furthermore, Azure Stack will simplify the complex process of deploying private/hosted clouds based on our experience building the Microsoft Cloud Platform System, a converged infrastructure solution.

Inside of azure pack it was “depending” on system center services. But Azure Stack will not “depend” on system Center but it is possible to integrate it with operation management suite and system Center .

Despite this disparity, Microsoft’s general approach seems to be to evolve and optimize server products for Azure and Office 365, and then to trickle down features to the on-premises editions where possible. It therefore pays for developers and admins working on Microsoft’s platform to keep an eye on the cloud platforms, since this is what you will get in a year or two even if you have no intention of becoming a cloud customer.

This approach does make sense, in that characteristics desirable in a cloud product, such as resilience and scalability, are also desirable on premises. It may give you pause for thought though if the pieces you depend on have no relevance in Microsoft’s cloud. We have already seen how the company killed Small Business Server, for which the last full version was in 2011.

That brings us to Azure Stack, the purpose of which is to bring pieces of Azure into your data Center for your very own Microsoft cloud. The existing Azure Pack already does this, but this was essentially a wrapper for System Center components (especially SCVMM) that allowed use of the Azure portal and some other features on premises.

Are many Cloud Platforms used to build Custom Hybrid Cloud Scenarios, like Cloud Foundry used quite often by different Infrastructure providers Like INTEL, EMC², VMware, Swisscom, since 2 days comes another one from Microsoft – Azure Stack , which is great for #hybrid#cloud .

Microsoft has launched the public preview of Azure Stack, something that has been in TAP for several months now. You can find the download on MSDN right now or from download link.

Azure Stack is a collection of software technologies that Microsoft uses for its Azure cloud computing infrastructure. It consists of “operating systems, frameworks, languages, tools and applications we are building in Azure” that are being extended to individual datacenters, Microsoft explained, in the white paper. However, Azure Stack is specifically designed for enterprise and service provider environments.

For instance, Microsoft has to scale its Azure infrastructure as part of operations. That’s done at a minimum by adding 20 racks of servers at a time. Azure Stack, in contrast, uses management technologies “that are purpose built to supply Azure Service capacity and do it at enterprise scale,” Microsoft’s white paper explained.

Azure Stack has four main layers, starting with a Cloud Infrastructure layer at its base, which represents Microsoft’s physical datacenter capacity (see chart).

The Azure Stack software.

Next up the stack there’s an Extensible Service Framework layer. It has three sublayers. The Foundational Services sublayer consists of solutions needed to create things like virtual machines, virtual networks and storage disks. The Additional Services sublayer provides APIs for third-party software vendors to add their services. The Core Services sublayer includes services commonly needed to support both PaaS and IaaS services.

The stack also contains a Unified Application Model layer, which Microsoft describes as a fulfillment service for consumers of cloud services. Interactions with this layer are carried out via Azure Resource Manager, which is a creation tool for organizations using cloud resources. Azure Resource Manager also coordinates requests for Azure services.

This is kind of like how you can get Adobe Creative Cloud or Office 365, if you’re familiar with that. You pay a monthly or yearly fee like Office 365 and get Visual Studio and a bunch of other benefits.

And if you’re doing really serious IoT or embedded work, native Android libraries, Linux kernel modules, or small boards like Raspberry PIs, check out http://visualgdb.com which is an amazing and very complete 3rd party add in for Visual Studio!

If you’re doing Arduino development, check out http://www.visualmicro.comwhich has a brand new version and really lights up Visual Studio with some powerful features like an automatic Arduino Board Downloader.

With this ebook, the ALM Rangers share their best practices in managing solution requirements and shipping solutions in an agile environment, an environment where transparency, simplicity, and trust prevail. The ebook is for Agile development teams and their Scrum Masters who want to explore and learn from the authors’ “dogfooding” experiences and their continuous adaptation of software requirements management. Product Owners and other stakeholders will also find value in this ebook by learning how they can support their Agile development teams and by gaining an understanding of the constraints of open-source community projects.

Below you’ll find the ebook’s Foreword and a few helpful sections from its Introduction:

Foreword

The ALM Rangers are a special group for several reasons. Not only are they innovative and focused on the real world, providing value-added solutions for the Visual Studio developer community, but they live and work in all four corners of the globe. The ALM Rangers are a volunteer organization. Talk about dedication! When we were offered the opportunity to write a foreword for this book, we knew we’d be part of something special.

The ALM Rangers don’t pontificate that they’ve found the one true way. This is practical advice and examples for producing great software by those who’ve done it and–most importantly–are still innovating and coding. Readers will find that they have virtual coworkers who share their experiences with honesty and humor, revealing learnings and what has worked for them. This doesn’t mean that this book lacks prescriptive guidance. The Rangers have embraced Visual Studio Online as their one and only home. They are evolving with the product, embracing open source software in GitHub to learn how successful OSS projects are run there and what the community values most. They’ve created an ecosystem that identifies the “low hanging fruit” and tracks it from idea to solution, and they never fail to recognize the Rangers and the ALM VPs who dedicate their personal time and passion to their OSS projects.

The extensive guidance shared here is not an end-to-end plan for everyone, although it could be used as a definitive guide for some teams. One of the many assets of this book is its organization into practical walkthroughs of typical ALM Ranger projects from idea to solution, presented as an easy to consume reference. Other bonuses are an appendix to quick-start your own project and reference checklists to keep you on track.

Among the authors, this book was called the “v1 dawn edition.” True to their core value of “learn from and share all experiences,” the ALM Rangers are always mindful that producing great software means continuous refinements from new learnings and feedback and that there will be more versions of this book. But first we invite you to immerse yourself in Managing Agile Open-Source Software Projects with Microsoft Visual Studio Online.

In the true spirit of Agile, ongoing innovation,

Sam GuckenheimerClemri Steyn

Introduction
This book assumes that you have at least a minimal understanding of Agile, Lean, and Scrum development concepts and are familiar with Team Foundation Server (TFS) and Visual Studio Online (VSO). To go beyond this book and expand your knowledge of Agile practices or Visual Studio technologies, MSDN and other Microsoft Press books offer both complete introductions and comprehensive information.

This book might not be for you if …
This book might not be for you if you are looking for an in-depth discussion focused on the process, development, or architecture of software requirements, tooling, or practices.

Similarly, if you are looking for source code or guidance on ALM, DevOps, or proven and official frameworks such as Agile, Scrum and Kanban, this book will not be fully relevant, and we recommend that you consider these publications instead: